Solo: A Star Wars Story (2018)

My Review

Lucasfilm has come out with a film about the backstory of Han Solo called “Solo: A Star Wars Story.” The long anticipated project features Alden Ehrenreich playing a young Han Solo, quite a challenge considering the iconic hero was well established as a young man by Harrison Ford in the first three “Star Wars” pictures of 1977, 1980, and 1983. Ehrenreich delivered a good performance and did very well in an almost impossible situation.

Director Ron Howard (“Cocoon” 1985) did his best in making a fun movie with good production values and passable writing by screenwriters Lawrence Kasdan and Jonathan Kasdan. Howard took over from the original directors, Phil Lord and Christopher Miller (“Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs” 2009), who were fired by Lucasfilm head Kathy Kennedy due to creative differences.

The cast includes Alden Ehrenreich, Woody Harrelson, Emilia Clarke, Danny Glover, Thandiwe Newton, Paul Bettany, Jon Favreau, Linda Hunt, Clint Howard, and Anthony Daniels. “Solo: A Star Wars Story” was a box office bomb, the first one in “Star Wars” franchise history, for producer Kathleen Kennedy, Lucasfilm Ltd., Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures, and The Walt Disney Company. It was filmed in England, Italy, Spain, and the Canary Islands. The movie received one Oscar nod for Best Visual Effects.